The Catholic Church is Targeting the Girl Scouts.

The Catholic Church, not satisfied with its role in ruining the lives of so many young boys, has focused its hateful gaze on a new target. Now they are investigating the Girl Scouts of the USA. So far they have encouraged some state legislatures to publically condemn the group.

NEW YORK (AP) -- Long a lightning rod for conservative criticism, the Girl Scouts of the USA are now facing their highest-level challenge yet: An official inquiry by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

At issue are concerns about program materials that some Catholics find offensive, as well as assertions that the Scouts associate with other groups espousing stances that conflict with church teaching. The Scouts, who have numerous parish-sponsored troops, deny many of the claims and defend their alliances.

The inquiry coincides with the Scouts' 100th anniversary celebrations and follows a chain of other controversies.

Earlier this year, legislators in Indiana and Alaska publicly called the Scouts into question, and the organization was berated in a series aired by a Catholic broadcast network. Last year, the Scouts angered some conservatives by accepting into a Colorado troop a 7-year-old transgender child who was born a boy but was being raised as a girl.

It’s one thing if the church doesn’t want its members joining the Girl Scouts. If it wants to encourage Catholic parents to keep their daughters from joining a group with a reputation as tainted as that of the Girl Scouts they have that right. But when any religious organization uses its strength to get public bodies to bully organizations it disagrees with that church has crossed the line. Sadly the church will never be called on the carpet for what it’s doing and if anyone launches an investigation of the church it will scream bloody murder and hide behind Constitutional protections that have been perverted by a judiciary that seems content to allow Christian organizations to use the First Amendment to protect any conduct they wish to engage in.